Spring is Breaking Out All Over!

April 20, 2013. Epic forcast. Confab with Dean, Barry, James, and me about flying XC. We were talking about Marion County, or maybe even Lookout Mountain. Conditions on launch were strong but the gusts were predictable and the between cycles were quite mild. It looked good, although totally blue. A few people launched and were fighting ratty and inconsistent ridge lift. James Dean launched and got over the ridge, but shortly after that got flushed out into the valley and went to land. Bummer.

7000'... what a cool place to be

I launched about 30 minutes later right around 3:30. I got up in ridge lift and it was squirrely. There were lots of lift bubbles but they were impossible to work in a full 360. It was a matter of milking it until you got a couple of grand over and from there you could catch a real boomer. I eventually found a thermal south of launch. Tipper came over and helped me max it out and we climbed to 7000’. Dean Funk, Jeff laughrey, Rob Dallas, and Mark Bolt had already headed south. I pointed my nose that way and followed suit.

The glide was painful. Nothing but sink the whole way. From 7k I was only able to glide about 5 miles despite going downwind. I hit another little thermal there that got me to Dr Dales. I found another little climb that was drifting fast and wasn’t really turning on. South of Dales the LZs weren’t good so I wanted to get high before moving further down range. While I’m working this little fart Barry Klein comes blazing through below me. He flys by me and manages to spot some birds working a thermal about half a mile ahead. It’s a better one and he soon climbs through my altitude. I leave my piece to go join him. I hit it and start climbing reasonably fast. I think “I’ve got it made... another climb to 7k”. Well, after about 4500 it starts to get a little squirrelly. There’s a strong core but I find myself doing half a turn in lift, the other half in sink. Barry calls that he’s averaging 700fpm and is out over the ridge while I’m a bit over the back. Right there is where i blow it because I decide to leave my climb to find whatever Barry is in. I can’t find it, and neither is my climb still working when I go back there. It’s all fallen apart.

Dr. Dales in my sights

I play it safe and head out into the valley towards Dr Dales. It’s an upwind glide and I want to make sure I get there with extra altitude. The glide is slow and I find almost no signs of lift anywhere. I get there with just enough altitude to do a single 360 before bringing it in on final at speed. I get a wing lifted and try to run it out but I end up dropping a corner of the bracket onto the ground. Not pretty, but workable.

Overall I give myself 9.5 miles on this flight. If I had made good on that thermal I would have easily had 16 or 17 miles. Most likely I would have gone all the way to Marion County Airport where Barry and Mark landed for a 25 miler. Rob and Jeff landed at Lookout. Dean pushed on and made it 10 miles short of Fort Payne... call it 60 miles! Somehow I didn’t think that I was prone to making such rookie mistakes, but the fact is... I’m a rookie when it comes to XC. I love it. I can’t wait to try again.

Raptor Heaven

April 22, 2013. Me and Marc Fink setup down at the Whitwell PG launch. It looked a little nicer for self launching. Marc launched at 2PM and had an extended sledder. There had been cycles coming in all morning but it got quiet just as we got set to launch. I launched half an hour later and hit a nice one right off of launch. I counted to 3 and banked up hard climbing well. Then I fell out the back and did an unscheduled launch dive. I tried to get back in it but by then I was below launch and too close to the trees. Not a single bump all the way to Castle's LZ. There was something breaking off over Castle's and I managed 3 or 4 turns in zero sink at about 200' over the ground. It didn't pan out and I landed.

Dave Pugh was around with some visiting PG pilots and he drove Marc's truck down and picked us up. Marc threw in the towel but I set up again at the HG launch and got off again at 4. Once again Dave came through for me offering to drive my van down to the Church where he and his friends were going to be kiting their PGs.

Wasn't strong enough to ridge soar. Got nothing much to speak of and headed toward the church. About halfway there I got something over a clearing with a house and pond. I worked a search pattern and finally found a broken climb. It was mostly parallel to the ridge and very slow going.

Star Gap

It slowly edged me closer and closer to the trees. I was drifting closer to the LZ so I didn't mind just hanging out. At the exact moment I reached ridge height it turned over the back and started to increase in strength. I rode it up to about 4500' before it fell apart. I flew back out and caught a new bubble in exactly the same spot. That one did exactly the same thing. Finally topped it out at 5500'. There was a stiff inversion there and I tried for literally 20 minutes to punch through but I was unable to get it. It was late and the thermals weren't strong. From there I could see Galloway's and I knew there would be lift enough in the valley to get me there. If I got half way there and hit another decent thermal I could have probably made Henson's. However it was getting late and my car was at the church and I hoped to get home in time to tuck the kids in bed.

Time to go to church

After that I headed out into the valley and that's when the magic happened. Right in line with the church LZ are those brown fields. There was a sweet little lift line that was working between 2500 and 3500. It was some of the smoooothest air I've ever had the pleasure to have flown in. It was close to 6PM and the sun had that amazing golden evening color. After a few minutes a few black vultures broke off of the ridge and came out to join me. Then a hawk I didn't recognize came right out and started swapping turns with me up close. About 8 or 9 turkey vultures came out and started messing around on the ridge. A while later 2 bald eagles flew over. Within a mile of me in any direction there were a dozen soaring birds of varying species all just floating around enjoying the same beautiful glass I was in. It was one of those life moments when you just have to say "Damn, is this possible? Am I really experiencing this?" It was better than in my dreams.

This was pure freedom and joy.